Chapel Hill To Honor Civil Rights Icon On Public Buses

The Chapel Hill Town Council approved a petition Monday evening requesting that the town's transit buses honor Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks with small memorial plaques on their front seats.

The Council directed that the plaques honor Parks, as well as Claudette Colvin and Mary Louise Smith, who were also arrested, jailed, charged and fined for refusing to give up their seats on a Montgomery, Ala., so white riders could sit.

Although Colvin and Ware are not as widely known as Parks, they were the plaintiffs in the court case that ended segregation on the buses. The case was fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.